How does everybody feel about fetchlands in White Weenie? White doesn't really have any inherent (real or virtual) card advantage outside of Land Tax/ Tithe/ Squadron Hawk, but the deck thinning of the fetchlands would seem to remedy this.
How does everybody feel about fetchlands in White Weenie? White doesn't really have any inherent (real or virtual) card advantage outside of Land Tax/ Tithe/ Squadron Hawk, but the deck thinning of the fetchlands would seem to remedy this.
Thoughts?
White Weenie needs its land drops every turn, if you throw in a fetch land to bring something into play tapped you have just ruined any advantage White Weenie had. Almost everyone has tested them at some point but honestly they just aren't needed in this deck type.
White Weenie needs its land drops every turn, if you throw in a fetch land to bring something into play tapped you have just ruined any advantage White Weenie had. Almost everyone has tested them at some point but honestly they just aren't needed in this deck type.
Onslaught/ Zendikar fetchlands (ie. Flooded Strand, Arid Mesa) don't come into play tapped, nor do they bring lands into play tapped...
Onslaught/ Zendikar fetchlands (ie. Flooded Strand, Arid Mesa) don't come into play tapped, nor do they bring lands into play tapped...
It has been mathmatically proven that deck thinning from fetchlands is so insignificant it is not worth running them for that sole reason. Fetchlands are still useful as they do allow you to shuffle your library, so if you say splashed blue for brainstorm or you ran sensei's diving top then they would have some merit. They also would be good if you ran something like step linx and used the multiple land drops to get landfall triggers. Many people don't run these cards though, and without them there is no need to really run fetchs. We also have knight of the white orchid and flagstones of trokair that allow us to fetch for addition lands while not paying life and the knights have proven to be quite capable as a 2/2 first striker that many competitive lists (legacy knights, mostly) do run him.
In the end, deck thinning has been mathmatically disproven, so there's no real reason to run them if that was your only one. And even then knight of the white orchid is your go-to if you want to thin the deck anyway.
It's a dangerous business, going out your door. You step onto the road, and if you don't keep your feet, there's no knowing where you might be swept off to.
Onslaught/ Zendikar fetchlands (ie. Flooded Strand, Arid Mesa) don't come into play tapped, nor do they bring lands into play tapped...
Those are true except for the life loss, but your typical cards that people can afford such as Terramorphic Expanse and the like do bring things into play tapped, either way I just don't see any fetch land helping. White Weenie has been SO refined that every single card in the deck is useful at almost every single time, so thinning the deck doesn't really help because it doesn't matter what I draw since 9 out of 10 times is useful. Squira13 is correct in saying the benefits are insignificant within MOST White Weenie decks and running something like Knight of the White Orchid is leaps and bounds superior to any fetch land.
Hey guys. I'm new to the forums and just wanted to post a white weenie deck that I've been building. I was hoping to have fixes in the deck for any type of deck and then be able to sideboard in game 2 for when I know what type of matchup I have.
The 2 offs in my deck (Imposing Sovereign, Mentor of the Meek, and Grand Abolisher) are really just because I would hate to ever have two of them on the field at the same time. It may be good to be able to replace them once they get the inevitable removal spell, but I feel like only running two of them makes the deck more consistent of not having dead cards in my hand.
The Silver-Inlaid Dagger is in there only because of the Precinct Captain. A 5/2 first strike is a much harder decision for the opponent to make on whether he wants to block it and potentially lose a 4 drop, or take the damage and give me another soldier token.
Day of Judgement is only there because I love its' synergy with Frontline Medic. Actually, Mentor of the Meek is there due to Frontline Medic and Hero of Bladehold as well. The Medic potentially makes it much easier to swing with both Hero and Mentor and still pay the two for extra card draw.
Finally, the life gain through the soul sisters (4 in main deck and 4 in sideboard) is merely a concession that though a white weenie deck, I may lose out to the more aggressive decks that hit way harder and faster than this will. If i fight a burn deck, I hopefully gain life beyond their ability to kill me quickly and if I fight another weenie deck, their creatures are simply giving me more life as well. They also give me more viable creatures to draw from with Mentor of the Meek.
Path to Exile in the sideboard is in case I ever need more removal, or if the 21 lands proves to be inconsistent and I can simply exile my own soldier tokens for a ramped land.
Finally, Thalia sideboard is simply for control decks. I can bring her in to replace Day of Judgement.
Please give me any tips or any suggestions. Definitely want to know what you all think.
looks pretty good already, theres just a few things i would do.
1. drop the soul sisters. I know you want the life gain, and you can get it with knight of meadowgrain. the knight is a much bigger presence on the board and can gain you just as much life as the sisters would. It also gets pretty scary with a equipment on it, which brigs me to my next point.
2. I think there are better equipment the the dagger. loxodon warhammer costs more but is way more powerful with the added trample and lifelink. If you can afford the expensive equipment like umezawa's jitte or sword of ____ and ____.
It's a dangerous business, going out your door. You step onto the road, and if you don't keep your feet, there's no knowing where you might be swept off to.
The new Theros card Cavalry Pegasus (not linked yet) looks pretty good. Maybe it'll have more omph in Pauper Weenie, but I can see it providing a ftw advantage in a strictly humans weenie deck of any kind. Thoughts?
For this deck, I wanted to incorporate some sligh mentality into an extremely low mana curve. As a result, this deck has 16 one drops, 20 two drops, and only 4 five drop finishers. I use nothing but super cheap pump and grow spells, and the onle exception is Pacifism, which I threw in to splash control.
The idea is that you can build up a swarm so quickly that you practically force your opponent to use wrath of god. And even then, you can just keep pumping them out.
When making a deck on a curve, it should be a pyramid -- lots of 1cc, less 2cc, less 3ccs, less 4cc, less 5cc. You have more 2s than 1s, and skip out on 3 and 4 straight to 5, of which you really should have 2.
(you only play a 4-of of a card you want to see in your opening hand, and 4 Serra angels means there is an almost 50% chance of you drawing it in your opening hand).
There are many other better 2cc cards than silver coat lion. Seriously, white knight and silver knight are strictly better than silver coat lion, and they're not expensive.
The problem with honor guard is that, ideally, you're tapped out because you cast all your creatures that you can. This means you have no mana left to use its ability.
Auras, in general, are bad. Holy strength is very bad. Nimbus wings is slightly better, but still well into the bad range.
looks pretty good already, theres just a few things i would do.
1. drop the soul sisters. I know you want the life gain, and you can get it with knight of meadowgrain. the knight is a much bigger presence on the board and can gain you just as much life as the sisters would. It also gets pretty scary with a equipment on it, which brigs me to my next point.
2. I think there are better equipment the the dagger. loxodon warhammer costs more but is way more powerful with the added trample and lifelink. If you can afford the expensive equipment like umezawa's jitte or sword of ____ and ____.
Thanks for the advice!
I did some playtesting and discovered that you were right about the Soul's Attendant life gain ability. She worked great in the mirror or against other types of swarm decks (mainly krenko goblin decks) but she was almost a dead card that simply pumped Champion of the Parish. I've decided that replacing her on the sideboard is the better idea. I also realized that Grand Abolisher and Imposing Sovereign were really matchup based as well. They didn't allow me to attack or win combat as aggressively as I wanted and were only great if I was playing a haste deck or a control deck. I've decided to try putting Hada Freeblade to replace the Soul's Attendant and Kazandu Blademaster to place the Grand Abolisher and Imposing Sovereign in the sideboard to replace my Gather the Townsfolk.
I also decided to replace the Brave the Elements with the sideboarded Path to Exile because I felt like it came in handy more often. It also helped me on pretty unfortunate mulligans where I had to exile my own 1 drop to get my second land or exile my Precinct Captain token to ramp up to the three I needed for some of my better cards.
On the equipment end, I do agree that the Silver-Inlaid Dagger is not the best of equipment, but it is incredibly well costed. Being able to give one of my first strike creatures +3/+0 on turn three to swing for 5 is incredibly helpful, and more likely to happen if I get screwed on mana. The Loxodon Warhammer would almost always take two turns just to play and then equip.
The new Theros card Cavalry Pegasus (not linked yet) looks pretty good. Maybe it'll have more omph in Pauper Weenie, but I can see it providing a ftw advantage in a strictly humans weenie deck of any kind. Thoughts?
Its not bad. I don't think its going to break any formats anytime soon, but as you said it might have a decent run in pauper. I don't think there's any cards in my deck that I would really want to take out to replace with this, but then again I'm not running a human-based list.
It's a dangerous business, going out your door. You step onto the road, and if you don't keep your feet, there's no knowing where you might be swept off to.
Enlistment Officer is good for a white soldier deck comprised mostly of creatures.
That it is. The only reason its not in the primer is that there is a full dedicated primer just to soldiers and i didn't want to fill the primer with a bunch of stuff that you can get more specific info for elsewhere. That, and the fact that it doesn't fit white weenie decks in general too well, its really only useful in only soldiers. Some soldiers and knights and kithkins and such are great even on their own without a dedicated tribal deck behind them, and those are the ones that I (tried to, at least) keep here.
It's a dangerous business, going out your door. You step onto the road, and if you don't keep your feet, there's no knowing where you might be swept off to.
4 Champion of the Parish
2 Hero of Bladehold
4 Mother of Runes
4 Precinct Captain
3 Serra Avenger
3 Silverblade Paladin
2 Stoneforge Mystic
4 Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
4 Honor of the Pure
2 Oblivion Ring
4 Swords to Plowshares
1 Umezawa's Jitte
2 Flagstones of Trokair
18 Plains
3 Wasteland
The list I've been running lately. More mid-rangey with an emphasis on power over speed, hence the 23 lands. Honor of the Pure is nasty with the Hero, the Paladin, and the Captain. Stoneforge Mystic plan b with Batterskull out of the Sideboard. Other sideboard cards rotate but typically include Cataclysm, various Swords of X and Y, Leyline, GY hate (typically Crypt since it's fastest), a second Jitte, occasionally the Enlightened Tutor package, and the other usual suspects.
4 Champion of the Parish
2 Hero of Bladehold
4 Mother of Runes
4 Precinct Captain
3 Serra Avenger
3 Silverblade Paladin
2 Stoneforge Mystic
4 Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
4 Honor of the Pure
2 Oblivion Ring
4 Swords to Plowshares
1 Umezawa's Jitte
2 Flagstones of Trokair
18 Plains
3 Wasteland
The list I've been running lately. More mid-rangey with an emphasis on power over speed, hence the 23 lands. Honor of the Pure is nasty with the Hero, the Paladin, and the Captain. Stoneforge Mystic plan b with Batterskull out of the Sideboard. Other sideboard cards rotate but typically include Cataclysm, various Swords of X and Y, Leyline, GY hate (typically Crypt since it's fastest), a second Jitte, occasionally the Enlightened Tutor package, and the other usual suspects.
hows the paladin treating you? normally I would run a mirran crusader there for the protection and the fact that it doesn't need another creature for double strike, but it does have the synergy with the captain.
With all the token generation I think Brimaz would be a decent addition as well, although I'm not entirely sure if he's exactly better than anything you already have, because it looks like you want the human synergy for the champion.
Aether vial could help out in the "lands" department as it would acceleration how quickly you can deploy your dudes, and you even happen to have a nice bundle of cards all with 2 cmc to ease your choice of ticking it up or not mid-game.
It's a dangerous business, going out your door. You step onto the road, and if you don't keep your feet, there's no knowing where you might be swept off to.
I think it's kind of a wash between the Crusader and the Paladin, the latter is better in a vacuum, but since this is a true creature swarm as opposed to an equipment deck, the Paladin is more synergistic.
Brimaz would be a welcome inclusion just because he's lower on the curve than Hero but last time i checked he's like what... $35?
It's a dangerous business, going out your door. You step onto the road, and if you don't keep your feet, there's no knowing where you might be swept off to.
Just skimmed the primer and was very surprised to see none of these mentioned:
Soltari Trooper Soltari Champion Loyal Pegasus Still not entirely sold on this guy--he is VERY efficient though. Jotun Grunt Early beats, shut down opponent's GY plan or return your own guys to your library. This guy is a tank and also happens to be a Soldier. Thunder Spirit He's from an era of weak creatures but still never been exactly replicated & really is pretty damn efficient suite of abilities + stats for the mana. There was a card they printed recently (name escapes me atm) but this guy was still slightly better. Also gets work done in Spirit tribal decks. I don't run him anymore but I used to and he was decent.
I'm running a WW build where all (or as many as I could find) are evasive. With a playset of Honor of the Pure (and the aforementioned Soltari Champion), no, I'm not really doing a lot of blocking or creature stalls. It's working better than any version I've tried in over a decade of trying, honestly.
Just skimmed the primer and was very surprised to see none of these mentioned:
Soltari Trooper Soltari Champion Loyal Pegasus Still not entirely sold on this guy--he is VERY efficient though. Jotun Grunt Early beats, shut down opponent's GY plan or return your own guys to your library. This guy is a tank and also happens to be a Soldier. Thunder Spirit He's from an era of weak creatures but still never been exactly replicated & really is pretty damn efficient suite of abilities + stats for the mana. There was a card they printed recently (name escapes me atm) but this guy was still slightly better. Also gets work done in Spirit tribal decks. I don't run him anymore but I used to and he was decent.
I'm running a WW build where all (or as many as I could find) are evasive. With a playset of Honor of the Pure (and the aforementioned Soltari Champion), no, I'm not really doing a lot of blocking or creature stalls. It's working better than any version I've tried in over a decade of trying, honestly.
you know, I thought I put most of the shadow dudes in here and now that I look back it looks like I stopped with just the monk/priest. Both look good to me.
If I mentioned war falcon I guess I have to bring up the Pegasus as they are really similar cards. I've never liked either of them but they find their niche here and there.
Is grunt really not in the Primer? huh. I could have sworn I put him in a while ago but I guess I didn't. I've used him in sideboards as yard hate many times and I'm surprised he's not already in here as well. I have not been as up to date with the primer as I would have liked.
Spirit looks fine for a flyer with first strike, as most of the other cards like him cost 1 more.
the phalanx/ward thing looks neat, basically a reoccurring HotP, if a bit mana intensive. I guess it's worth of a mention. I wouldn't run either card by itself though.
I've always liked the evasive guys with shadow, but one thing that bothers me a decent amount is when you have too many, and you absolutely need to block. I've lost a few games going with the all-out evasion dudes and sometimes it works well, and sometimes you get steam-rolled by a tribe that can beat face faster than you. I run into the same problem a lot with my zombie deck because the good cheap ones like carrion feeder and gravecrawler can't block. If that ever happens to you I would probably recommend some life gain like loxodon warhammer as it makes it so you really don't even need to worry about blocking at all. I've personally moved to a more death and taxes build that plays way more like a control deck than aggro. games are way slower and usually just one off a lone batterskull and thalia over trying to race, but part of that is just because my playgroup has a lot of fast combo out there, and pure aggro tends to be just not fast enough for stuff like storm.
It's a dangerous business, going out your door. You step onto the road, and if you don't keep your feet, there's no knowing where you might be swept off to.
Right on.. I just run Wraths and much spot removal to ensure aggro is not an issue. Doesn't always work, but frequently does. I've also relied upon, yeah, Lox Warhammer or even Congregate over the years.
My defense of the Leader/Ward combo is that a)it's repeatable effect and b) you can still get some decent value out of either one even if the other piece doesn't show up. But when you get both out...oh brother. I smiled at your analysis because I'm on the verge of removing Honors because they actually feel a bit underpowered by comparison (and honestly a little redundant with all the other Crusade options available nowadays..) it feels kinda crazy having difficulty justifying deckslots for what is, after all, a 'better-crusade' but here I am lol..
And...yes, I run the hell out Wrath of God too. Kinda surprised to hear that's not canon. I run it for exactly the same reason folks run Armageddon. I will almost always stabilize faster than my opponent with that low curve. I also run 2x of both Elspth K.A. And Elspth, S.H.. I also run Kjeldoran Outpost for this purpose. Works for me ok.
Right on.. I just run Wraths and much spot removal to ensure aggro is not an issue. Doesn't always work, but frequently does. I've also relied upon, yeah, Lox Warhammer or even Congregate over the years.
My defense of the Leader/Ward combo is that a)it's repeatable effect and b) you can still get some decent value out of either one even if the other piece doesn't show up. But when you get both out...oh brother. I smiled at your analysis because I'm on the verge of removing Honors because they actually feel a bit underpowered by comparison (and honestly a little redundant with all the other Crusade options available nowadays..) it feels kinda crazy having difficulty justifying deckslots for what is, after all, a 'better-crusade' but here I am lol..
And...yes, I run the hell out Wrath of God too. Kinda surprised to hear that's not canon. I run it for exactly the same reason folks run Armageddon. I will almost always stabilize faster than my opponent with that low curve. I also run 2x of both Elspth K.A. And Elspth, S.H.. I also run Kjeldoran Outpost for this purpose. Works for me ok.
The leader/ward combo is interesting enough that I do want to throw together a budget list without an anthem and see how it works. The one thing I fear is someone disrupting it by killing the leader, but then I guess you still get the counters so its not too bad. Actually the fact that everything still gets to keep its counters is a plus even if you kill it, if someone disenchants HotP you're left with jack didley squat.
As for wrath not being typical; I think it boils down to how you build your deck. For the most part, a generic white weenie deck is designed for aggro more than resilience, and the wraths really hurt if you do not have recursive stuff or things that survive it. But if you build your deck with wraths in mind then they are totally a viable option for dealing with a wide range of threats. So I would say in a general sense wrath sucks for this deck but if you build your deck with it in mind then it becomes a strong reset button that you are better equipped to recover from. Its a really good card, but you can't just shoe it in to any old WW deck and expect it to do well, it does require some building around to work around its symmetry. We play just as many creatures as the decks we're going to try to wrath so we need to make sure ours survive or we can rebuild faster than our opponent. Cards like you mentioned do that really well, elspeth especially as the wrath gives her a few turns of safety to not only make some tokens but build up her loyalty so she can fire off an ultimate without too much worry.
It's a dangerous business, going out your door. You step onto the road, and if you don't keep your feet, there's no knowing where you might be swept off to.
Thoughts?
White Weenie needs its land drops every turn, if you throw in a fetch land to bring something into play tapped you have just ruined any advantage White Weenie had. Almost everyone has tested them at some point but honestly they just aren't needed in this deck type.
W White Weenie
Onslaught/ Zendikar fetchlands (ie. Flooded Strand, Arid Mesa) don't come into play tapped, nor do they bring lands into play tapped...
It has been mathmatically proven that deck thinning from fetchlands is so insignificant it is not worth running them for that sole reason. Fetchlands are still useful as they do allow you to shuffle your library, so if you say splashed blue for brainstorm or you ran sensei's diving top then they would have some merit. They also would be good if you ran something like step linx and used the multiple land drops to get landfall triggers. Many people don't run these cards though, and without them there is no need to really run fetchs. We also have knight of the white orchid and flagstones of trokair that allow us to fetch for addition lands while not paying life and the knights have proven to be quite capable as a 2/2 first striker that many competitive lists (legacy knights, mostly) do run him.
In the end, deck thinning has been mathmatically disproven, so there's no real reason to run them if that was your only one. And even then knight of the white orchid is your go-to if you want to thin the deck anyway.
Those are true except for the life loss, but your typical cards that people can afford such as Terramorphic Expanse and the like do bring things into play tapped, either way I just don't see any fetch land helping. White Weenie has been SO refined that every single card in the deck is useful at almost every single time, so thinning the deck doesn't really help because it doesn't matter what I draw since 9 out of 10 times is useful. Squira13 is correct in saying the benefits are insignificant within MOST White Weenie decks and running something like Knight of the White Orchid is leaps and bounds superior to any fetch land.
W White Weenie
http://magic.tcgplayer.com/db/print.asp?ID=3096
And Squira is absolutely right.
I don't think I'd run Knight of the White Orchid though. There are better things you could be doing at two mana.
4 Champion of the Parish
4 Soul's Attendant
2 Imposing Sovereign
4 Precinct Captain
2 Grand Abolisher
2 Mentor of the Meek
4 Frontline Medic
4 Fiend Hunter
2 Hero of Bladehold
Instant
4 Brave the Elements
2 Day of Judgement
Enchantment
4 Honor of the Pure
Artifact
1 Silver-Inlaid Dagger
Land
15 Plains
4 Cavern of Souls
2 Emeria, the Sky Ruin
4 Soul Warden
2 Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
Instants
4 Path to Exile
Sorcery
4 Gather the Townsfolk
1 Increasing Devotion
Hey guys. I'm new to the forums and just wanted to post a white weenie deck that I've been building. I was hoping to have fixes in the deck for any type of deck and then be able to sideboard in game 2 for when I know what type of matchup I have.
The 2 offs in my deck (Imposing Sovereign, Mentor of the Meek, and Grand Abolisher) are really just because I would hate to ever have two of them on the field at the same time. It may be good to be able to replace them once they get the inevitable removal spell, but I feel like only running two of them makes the deck more consistent of not having dead cards in my hand.
The Silver-Inlaid Dagger is in there only because of the Precinct Captain. A 5/2 first strike is a much harder decision for the opponent to make on whether he wants to block it and potentially lose a 4 drop, or take the damage and give me another soldier token.
Day of Judgement is only there because I love its' synergy with Frontline Medic. Actually, Mentor of the Meek is there due to Frontline Medic and Hero of Bladehold as well. The Medic potentially makes it much easier to swing with both Hero and Mentor and still pay the two for extra card draw.
Finally, the life gain through the soul sisters (4 in main deck and 4 in sideboard) is merely a concession that though a white weenie deck, I may lose out to the more aggressive decks that hit way harder and faster than this will. If i fight a burn deck, I hopefully gain life beyond their ability to kill me quickly and if I fight another weenie deck, their creatures are simply giving me more life as well. They also give me more viable creatures to draw from with Mentor of the Meek.
Path to Exile in the sideboard is in case I ever need more removal, or if the 21 lands proves to be inconsistent and I can simply exile my own soldier tokens for a ramped land.
Finally, Thalia sideboard is simply for control decks. I can bring her in to replace Day of Judgement.
Please give me any tips or any suggestions. Definitely want to know what you all think.
1. drop the soul sisters. I know you want the life gain, and you can get it with knight of meadowgrain. the knight is a much bigger presence on the board and can gain you just as much life as the sisters would. It also gets pretty scary with a equipment on it, which brigs me to my next point.
2. I think there are better equipment the the dagger. loxodon warhammer costs more but is way more powerful with the added trample and lifelink. If you can afford the expensive equipment like umezawa's jitte or sword of ____ and ____.
GWUBRDraft my Old Border Nostalgia Cube! and/or The Little Pauper Cube That Could!RBUWG
Modern:WDeath & TaxesW | RUGRUG DelverRUG
20x Plains
Creatures
4x Serra Angel
4x Elite Vanguard
4x Infantry Veteran
4x Honor Guard
4x Squadron Hawk
4x Silvercoat Lion
4x Honor of the Pure
4x Holy Strength
4x Nimbus Wings
4x Pacifism
For this deck, I wanted to incorporate some sligh mentality into an extremely low mana curve. As a result, this deck has 16 one drops, 20 two drops, and only 4 five drop finishers. I use nothing but super cheap pump and grow spells, and the onle exception is Pacifism, which I threw in to splash control.
The idea is that you can build up a swarm so quickly that you practically force your opponent to use wrath of god. And even then, you can just keep pumping them out.
(you only play a 4-of of a card you want to see in your opening hand, and 4 Serra angels means there is an almost 50% chance of you drawing it in your opening hand).
There are many other better 2cc cards than silver coat lion. Seriously, white knight and silver knight are strictly better than silver coat lion, and they're not expensive.
The problem with honor guard is that, ideally, you're tapped out because you cast all your creatures that you can. This means you have no mana left to use its ability.
Auras, in general, are bad. Holy strength is very bad. Nimbus wings is slightly better, but still well into the bad range.
Instead of pacifism, why not swords to plowshares, path to exile, or oblivion ring?
"Sometimes, the situation is outracing a threat, sometimes it's ignoring it, and sometimes it involves sideboarding in 4x Hope//Pray." --Doug Linn
Thanks for the advice!
I did some playtesting and discovered that you were right about the Soul's Attendant life gain ability. She worked great in the mirror or against other types of swarm decks (mainly krenko goblin decks) but she was almost a dead card that simply pumped Champion of the Parish. I've decided that replacing her on the sideboard is the better idea. I also realized that Grand Abolisher and Imposing Sovereign were really matchup based as well. They didn't allow me to attack or win combat as aggressively as I wanted and were only great if I was playing a haste deck or a control deck. I've decided to try putting Hada Freeblade to replace the Soul's Attendant and Kazandu Blademaster to place the Grand Abolisher and Imposing Sovereign in the sideboard to replace my Gather the Townsfolk.
My new deck looks like this:
4 Champion of the Parish
4 Hada Freeblade
4 Precinct Captain
4 Kazandu Blademaster
2 Mentor of the Meek
4 Frontline Medic
4 Fiend Hunter
2 Hero of Bladehold
Instant
4 Path to Exile
Sorcery
2 Day of Judgement
4 Honor of the Pure
Artifact
1 Silver-Inlaid Dagger
Land
15 Plains
4 Cavern of Souls
2 Emeria, the Sky Ruin
4 Soul's Attendant
2 Grand Abolisher
2 Imposing Sovereign
2 Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
Instants
4 Brave the Elements
1 Increasing Devotion
I also decided to replace the Brave the Elements with the sideboarded Path to Exile because I felt like it came in handy more often. It also helped me on pretty unfortunate mulligans where I had to exile my own 1 drop to get my second land or exile my Precinct Captain token to ramp up to the three I needed for some of my better cards.
On the equipment end, I do agree that the Silver-Inlaid Dagger is not the best of equipment, but it is incredibly well costed. Being able to give one of my first strike creatures +3/+0 on turn three to swing for 5 is incredibly helpful, and more likely to happen if I get screwed on mana. The Loxodon Warhammer would almost always take two turns just to play and then equip.
Its not bad. I don't think its going to break any formats anytime soon, but as you said it might have a decent run in pauper. I don't think there's any cards in my deck that I would really want to take out to replace with this, but then again I'm not running a human-based list.
That it is. The only reason its not in the primer is that there is a full dedicated primer just to soldiers and i didn't want to fill the primer with a bunch of stuff that you can get more specific info for elsewhere. That, and the fact that it doesn't fit white weenie decks in general too well, its really only useful in only soldiers. Some soldiers and knights and kithkins and such are great even on their own without a dedicated tribal deck behind them, and those are the ones that I (tried to, at least) keep here.
2 Hero of Bladehold
4 Mother of Runes
4 Precinct Captain
3 Serra Avenger
3 Silverblade Paladin
2 Stoneforge Mystic
4 Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
4 Honor of the Pure
2 Oblivion Ring
4 Swords to Plowshares
1 Umezawa's Jitte
2 Flagstones of Trokair
18 Plains
3 Wasteland
The list I've been running lately. More mid-rangey with an emphasis on power over speed, hence the 23 lands. Honor of the Pure is nasty with the Hero, the Paladin, and the Captain. Stoneforge Mystic plan b with Batterskull out of the Sideboard. Other sideboard cards rotate but typically include Cataclysm, various Swords of X and Y, Leyline, GY hate (typically Crypt since it's fastest), a second Jitte, occasionally the Enlightened Tutor package, and the other usual suspects.
hows the paladin treating you? normally I would run a mirran crusader there for the protection and the fact that it doesn't need another creature for double strike, but it does have the synergy with the captain.
With all the token generation I think Brimaz would be a decent addition as well, although I'm not entirely sure if he's exactly better than anything you already have, because it looks like you want the human synergy for the champion.
Aether vial could help out in the "lands" department as it would acceleration how quickly you can deploy your dudes, and you even happen to have a nice bundle of cards all with 2 cmc to ease your choice of ticking it up or not mid-game.
Brimaz would be a welcome inclusion just because he's lower on the curve than Hero but last time i checked he's like what... $35?
Soltari Trooper
Soltari Champion
Loyal Pegasus Still not entirely sold on this guy--he is VERY efficient though.
Jotun Grunt Early beats, shut down opponent's GY plan or return your own guys to your library. This guy is a tank and also happens to be a Soldier.
Thunder Spirit He's from an era of weak creatures but still never been exactly replicated & really is pretty damn efficient suite of abilities + stats for the mana. There was a card they printed recently (name escapes me atm) but this guy was still slightly better. Also gets work done in Spirit tribal decks. I don't run him anymore but I used to and he was decent.
I'm running a WW build where all (or as many as I could find) are evasive. With a playset of Honor of the Pure (and the aforementioned Soltari Champion), no, I'm not really doing a lot of blocking or creature stalls. It's working better than any version I've tried in over a decade of trying, honestly.
Another fun bit of tech I'll share: Phalanx Leader + Flickering Ward. Total Insanity. Try it out!
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450-Card "Artificer's Cube" https://cubecobra.com/cube/list/artificer
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you know, I thought I put most of the shadow dudes in here and now that I look back it looks like I stopped with just the monk/priest. Both look good to me.
If I mentioned war falcon I guess I have to bring up the Pegasus as they are really similar cards. I've never liked either of them but they find their niche here and there.
Is grunt really not in the Primer? huh. I could have sworn I put him in a while ago but I guess I didn't. I've used him in sideboards as yard hate many times and I'm surprised he's not already in here as well. I have not been as up to date with the primer as I would have liked.
Spirit looks fine for a flyer with first strike, as most of the other cards like him cost 1 more.
the phalanx/ward thing looks neat, basically a reoccurring HotP, if a bit mana intensive. I guess it's worth of a mention. I wouldn't run either card by itself though.
I've always liked the evasive guys with shadow, but one thing that bothers me a decent amount is when you have too many, and you absolutely need to block. I've lost a few games going with the all-out evasion dudes and sometimes it works well, and sometimes you get steam-rolled by a tribe that can beat face faster than you. I run into the same problem a lot with my zombie deck because the good cheap ones like carrion feeder and gravecrawler can't block. If that ever happens to you I would probably recommend some life gain like loxodon warhammer as it makes it so you really don't even need to worry about blocking at all. I've personally moved to a more death and taxes build that plays way more like a control deck than aggro. games are way slower and usually just one off a lone batterskull and thalia over trying to race, but part of that is just because my playgroup has a lot of fast combo out there, and pure aggro tends to be just not fast enough for stuff like storm.
My defense of the Leader/Ward combo is that a)it's repeatable effect and b) you can still get some decent value out of either one even if the other piece doesn't show up. But when you get both out...oh brother. I smiled at your analysis because I'm on the verge of removing Honors because they actually feel a bit underpowered by comparison (and honestly a little redundant with all the other Crusade options available nowadays..) it feels kinda crazy having difficulty justifying deckslots for what is, after all, a 'better-crusade' but here I am lol..
And...yes, I run the hell out Wrath of God too. Kinda surprised to hear that's not canon. I run it for exactly the same reason folks run Armageddon. I will almost always stabilize faster than my opponent with that low curve. I also run 2x of both Elspth K.A. And Elspth, S.H.. I also run Kjeldoran Outpost for this purpose. Works for me ok.
Fully-powered 600-Card "Dream Cube" https://cubecobra.com/cube/list/dreamcube
450-Card "Artificer's Cube" https://cubecobra.com/cube/list/artificer
Cubing in Indianapolis...send me a PM!!
The leader/ward combo is interesting enough that I do want to throw together a budget list without an anthem and see how it works. The one thing I fear is someone disrupting it by killing the leader, but then I guess you still get the counters so its not too bad. Actually the fact that everything still gets to keep its counters is a plus even if you kill it, if someone disenchants HotP you're left with jack didley squat.
As for wrath not being typical; I think it boils down to how you build your deck. For the most part, a generic white weenie deck is designed for aggro more than resilience, and the wraths really hurt if you do not have recursive stuff or things that survive it. But if you build your deck with wraths in mind then they are totally a viable option for dealing with a wide range of threats. So I would say in a general sense wrath sucks for this deck but if you build your deck with it in mind then it becomes a strong reset button that you are better equipped to recover from. Its a really good card, but you can't just shoe it in to any old WW deck and expect it to do well, it does require some building around to work around its symmetry. We play just as many creatures as the decks we're going to try to wrath so we need to make sure ours survive or we can rebuild faster than our opponent. Cards like you mentioned do that really well, elspeth especially as the wrath gives her a few turns of safety to not only make some tokens but build up her loyalty so she can fire off an ultimate without too much worry.
Any suggestions to make my WW better?
I want it to be creature heavy.
1 Path to Exile
3 Pariah
4 Honor of the Pure
3 Brave the Elements
4 Soldier of the Pantheon
4 Figure of Destiny
4 Spirit of the Labyrinth
4 Imposing Sovereign
4 Accorder Paladin
3 Celestial Crusader
20 Plains
These are the decks that I have constructed, and are ready to play:
01. Ankh Sligh to be exact.